The present invention relates to the manufacture of edible products having dissimilar inner and outer portions, and, more particularly to the manufacturer of such products in which the inner portion is enveloped by the outer portion.
The types of products to which the present invention relates includes baked goods that are baked from dough pieces having an outer layer of farnacious dough and a core which may be a dissimilar dough or another material such as a jam, cream, puree, paste, or other extrudable form of fruit, cheese, meat, vegetable, confection or other edible substance. In those products where the core is also a dough, the inner and outer doughs would be dissimilar in composition so as to produce different tastes, colors, appearances, textures, consistencies, or the like in the inner and outer portions of the baked product.
In the past, products of this type have been formed from laminated sheets in which two dough layers are separated by a layer of filling material. This approach is used in the method disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,494,302 wherein the laminated sheet is divided transversely and longitudinally into rectangular dough pieces. The product produced by the method and apparatus of that patent is danish pastry. If such an approach were used to produce products using doughs which spread during the baking process, like soft cookie doughs, the individual rectangular pieces would have to be separated in both the longitudinal and transverse directions to prevent the dough pieces from fusing together during baking. It would, of course, require extra labor or machinery to effect such separations.
The laminated sheet approach is not suitable for producing products having the round configuration associated with most conventional cookies. To achieve a round baked product, the dough piece must be round or substantially round, depending on the extent to which the dough spreads during baking. To cut round dough pieces from a dough sheet produces a high proportion of scrap. In the production of round unfilled cookies and crackers, the scrap is mixed back into the dough so there is no waste. However, this cannot be done when the dough sheet is a laminate of different materials. The scrap from such a laminate contains some of each material, and to mix it into either of the materials in quantity would change the character of that material and blur the distinction between the outer and inner portions of the baked product.
Another approach to forming products having different inner and outer portions, is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,572,259. In this approach, the two materials are concentrically extruded and the extrudate rope is divided and formed into concentric dough balls by a pair of rotating wheels having spirally configured peripheries. The apparatus shown, while effective for use in small bakeries, has a limited production capacity and requires a relatively large floor area for its capacity.
The typical band oven used in large commercial bakeries carries up to 18 rows of two inch diameter cookies. The machine of the patent under discussion is capable of producing only a single row of dough pieces. Therefore, 18 of these machines would be required to fill a modern high production oven. Also, it would be necessary to provide a system of conveyors to carry the dough pieces from the machines and deposit them in a regular pattern on the band of the oven.
In the co-pending application of Albert A. Pinto, Ser. No. 507,401, filed June 24, 1983 and assigned to the assignee of the present application, an improved method and appartus is disclosed for forming filled baked goods with low waste, and in quantities sufficient to supply a modern band oven. In the method and apparatus disclosed in this copending application, two dissimilar materials are continuously co-extruded to provide a series of parallel extrudate ropes each composed of an inner core and an outer tube of different materials. The extrudate ropes are deposited on a continuously moving horizontal conveyor and are divided into dough pieces by a reciprocating cutter. The cutter employs blunt knives that displace the inner core material away from the zone beneath the knives, seal the outer tube to itself along that zone, and sever the outer tube within that zone. On each stroke of the cutter, one dough piece is formed at the end of the each extrudate rope.
This apparatus produces dough pieces in sufficient quantity to supply a band oven, but it must be run at top speed to do so, and even then it cannot match the production rate of some ovens.
Reciprocating cutter mechanisms are subject to significant impact loading each time the cutter blades strike the backing plate beneath the conveyor belt. These impact loadings produce vibrations in the reciprocating mechanism which limit the speed at which the machine can run efficiently. Also, high speed operation causes the machine to wear rapidly and leads to malfunctions with attendant down time while repairs are being made.